Democratic leverage over appropriations is fortified by the broadly accepted understanding that as the party controlling both Congress and the White House, Republicans are likely to get the lion’s share of public blame for a government shutdown.

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'control.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Origin and Etymology of control

Middle English countrollen, from Anglo-French contrerouler, from contreroule copy of an account, audit, from Medieval Latin contrarotulus, from Latin contra- + Medieval Latin rotulus roll — more at roll

a (1):an experiment in which the subjects are treated as in a parallel experiment except for omission of the procedure or agent under test and which is used as a standard of comparison in judging experimental effects —called alsocontrol experiment

(2):one (such as an organism, culture, or group) that is part of a control

b:a device or mechanism used to regulate or guide the operation of a machine, apparatus, or system

the controls of the aircraft

c:an organization that directs a spaceflight

mission control

d:a personality or spirit believed to actuate the utterances or performances of a spiritualist medium

Now the mortgage holders — identified in court papers as Medford Real Estate, Medford Capitol LLC and TBK Bank, SSB — are suing to foreclose on the house and regain control of the property before prosecutors seize it.

Between 25 and 30 percent of Harris County - home to 4.5 million people in Houston and its near suburbs - was flooded by Tuesday afternoon, according to an estimate from Jeff Lindner, a meteorologist with the county flood control district.

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'control.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

History for control

In medieval England, records were kept in a variety of French. In this variety of French, a contreroule, or “counter-roll,” was a piece of parchment on which payments and receipts were written down. The verb contrerouler meant to check the original records against the “counter-roll” to be sure no mistakes were made. These two words were the source of our noun and verb control. The sense “checking for mistakes” survives in the way we use control to mean something used to check the results of a scientific experiment.

control

medical
Definition of control

a:an experiment in which the subjects are treated as in a parallel experiment except for omission of the procedure or agent under test and which is used as a standard of comparison in judging experimental effects —called alsocontrol experiment

b:one (as an organism, culture, or group) that is part of a control

Law Dictionary

control

transitive verb
con·trol

legal
Definition of control

controlled; controlling

1:to exercise restraining or directing influence over especially by law